Stars Rise

XXXIII. Hora Prima - The Boss and Leander

Hora Prima

The boss worked some mornings out in his solarium — a magic glass garden kept temperate throughout the winter.

It was located on the roof of the main Potestas Tower building, hundreds of feet below the hovering penthouse, the roof of which the party last night had taken place.

While Ilan read reports and signed documents, he waited for Cristo to appear, but he had to send away a dozen other visitors from the second the sun rose, and none of them were him.

The sun had come up early and somehow Potestas was expected to do something about it. Someone tried to kill him and the whole city wanted to know what he planned to do about that too.

Every time he got rid of one of them, the solarium fell into a not quite silence as the gardeners whispered with security guards and the whole staff speculated in media vox the cause of the solar irregularity and whether they were all about to drop dead today.

When the thirteenth petitioner entered the solarium by half secunda (though the sun's position was closer to hora quarta) Ilan began to regret his open door Saturday morning policy. He threw down his stack of papers, and on second glance recognized Leander Prince striding across the garden path toward him, careful to keep his brogue-shod feet out of the flower beds.

The suit Leander wore couldn't belong to him; it was tailored, but not to his size. The shoulders were tight yet the arms and waist managed to bag. He lost the aqua vest and tie. The wide peak lapels on his shiny black silk dinner jacket looked ridiculous without them.

Clearly the clothing had been given to him by Doctor Reveur — Cristo said Leander 'replaced' the dead man — but the color of the tie must not have been to his liking. Potestas preferred a wool-silk blend jacket for the daytime, and with a shake of his head he scribbled himself a note to have Leander fitted for a rope stripe suit in cyan or azure and matching double breasted vest.

And a tie with more gravity, to match his serious disposition.

Even his "Good morning" was steel and flint, so humorless it was funny.

"Good morning," said Ilan, and he put aside his work to give Leander his full attention, then noticed that Leander was standing at attention. "Have a seat if you like."

Eyes of iron examined the patio furniture and Leander stayed where he was.

"Boss, I didn't tell you the truth last night," he said. "I feel obligated to admit that I don't know Cristo."

"I had that figured out already," Potestas said with a jovial wiggle of his head. "You 'arrived' just as the doctor died, isn't that how it works?"

"I'm not sure what you mean. I don't know how it works."

"But you came here from a different world. After you died. And then Louis died. That's the story, isn't it? That's how Louis said it would happen, and Cristo said you were Louis's replacement."

Leander said, "I have no idea whether everything Cristo said last night was a lie."

"Except that," said Ilan.

"Louis Reveur told me to trust you and no one else. It was a mistake to go along with everything Cristo said. I hoped to leverage his lie to get him to tell me everything, but unfortunately he refused, and then he disappeared."

"Leander," said Ilan, "I would like you to join my security forces. In fact, I want you to guard my person. I expect you won't betray my trust a second time.

"I also expect you to have questions, about me, the company, the city, the empire. Louis was insufferable for years after he popped up out of his grave or whatever the story is. In approximately a hundred and twenty seconds I want to get back to my work and I won't tolerate interruptions. You have two minutes to ask, so choose carefully. Or don't, just spew whatever comes to mind first, seconds are ticking after all."